260 cars in German motorway crash

[KNU7S]

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Many injured in German motorway crash

 

[spock500]

Good grief, not even foggy -

I wish them well, hope the injuries are minimal -

 

[LimitedSlip]

See the usual mention of excessive speed "thought" to be involved... before anyone even knows.

 

[davidjpowell]

I was driven in Germany a couple of years ago, in heavy rain. In the UK i would have been travelling at less than 70. We were travelling at 100 MPH and I could not see beyond the car in front (who was very close). It was perturbing.

It was not comfortable.

We were overtaken by a marked car and a few miles later came across an accident.

It's fine as long as everyone does the same speed, but one crash quickly creates a knock on situation.

 

[LimitedSlip]

Speed may be an issue in/cause of this... I just don't like the automatic speeding inculcation that is always proffered.

 

[oldcro]

It could have been caused by driving too slow and the drivers getting bored and not paying attention. On the other hand...

 

[spock500]

I guess it's by definition that they were going too fast or otherwise they would have had time to break/avoid?

 

[Matt32AMG]

I lived in Germany a while back, they have no more accidents than we have in the UK, it’s just that when they do have them they're big, and they tend to involve loads of cars particularly on Autobahns. However, from the governments point of view they save money on hospital care as marginal injuries that say we’d get here in the UK, tend to be fatal in Germany.

 

[A210AMG]

From what I have found in europe as much as they are good at getting over they do follow close...

Thats a big accident though hope its just the metal thats damaged and people ok.

 

[Matt32AMG]

From what I have found in europe as much as they are good at getting over they do follow close...

Thats a big accident though hope its just the metal thats damaged and people ok.

Absolutely

 

[IanA2]

I guess they were all a bit too close to each other.

 

[Nik_Endeavour]

Now wasn't there a thread here that claimed that Autobahns are safer and higher speed didn't matter in motorway accidents. Well ....

 

[ringway]

I'm sure that Accident Claims4u whatever they are called will have had a man or two at the scene before the emergency services arrived.

 

[EDZ649]

If anyone needs some Merc parts best keep an eye on ebay.de over the next few weeks!

 

[Dave Lewis]

Too fast, too close, given the the road conditions and lack of visibility (and imagination).
ABS, ESP, Distronic - all useless if the drivers display such poor risk assessment.

 

[spock500]

Sooner or later they will bring speeds down not only for safety but for environmental reasons -

IIRC the USA did something similar in the '70's imposing a 55mph limit when the fuel crisis hit -

 

[hawk20]

Let's hope Germany will soon accept the same sort of speed limits that we have in the rest of Europe.

 

[mb240]

Now wasn't there a thread here that claimed that Autobahns are safer and higher speed didn't matter in motorway accidents. Well ....

It's true about the autobahns being safer and derestricted zones. The accident was caused by weather conditions and the total amount of 250+ cars wasn't just one giant pileup in a few minutes, it happened over a two hour period with very heavy rain. And the speed limit in that section of the A2 i believe is actually one of the 130kph limited zones.

Someone on the TTG forums said they got caught in the same storm and water was up to the hubs.......

 

[LimitedSlip]

Let's hope Germany will soon accept the same sort of speed limits that we have in the rest of Europe.

Why?

 

[st4]

Let's hope Germany will soon accept the same sort of speed limits that we have in the rest of Europe.

Up to them really. There is a 120kmph limit over the whole of saxony IIRC.

IMHO this is a shame. Driving is about using your judgement to decide what speed, road position to use. A limit shouldn't really be needed. Common sense should prevail.

Of course incidents like this illustrate that from time to time it doesn't, but on the whole I wouldn't view driving on a de restricted road as an unsafe thing to do. After all, big crash, but we don't hear of every journey thats completed in comfort and safety.